Microsoft to launch disc-less Xbox One (due 7 May 2019 TBC)

KK wrote:The Microsoft GamePass at least makes their own titles, and a number of third party titles, much better value than purchasing outright.

Digital tends to work best overall when you’re not interested in purchasing games at launch. More recently games have been cheaper digitally (Shadow Of The Tomb Raider for example is already £27.50) but there’s no reselling opportunities.

This needs to be a thing next gen. (Wasn't it going to be a feature of the XB1 before those plans got ditched?) Would love it if they let us sell or trade digital games...

Frank wrote:Willingly spending more for arguably less (no resale value) is telling the people setting the prices that they're actually perfectly fine, but that's obviously not the case. Just because they can afford them doesn't mean they should buy them.

Go for whatever's cheapest. Usually it's a disk, and, unless it's an online title or some big stupid sandbox, you can sell it on once you're finished.

No they should be going for whatever they want to buy and not be dictated to by total strangers on what they should spend their money on.

Next gen I'd happily go for a digital only route as the last lot of new releases (God Of War, Spider-Man, Red Dead 2, PUBG Pubg pre-order and a shitload of VR titles) have been digital helped with slightly cheaper top up codes from CDKeys.

Even a loyalty scheme could work. Purchase, say, 8 games and get the next one free.

KjGarly wrote:

Frank wrote:Willingly spending more for arguably less (no resale value) is telling the people setting the prices that they're actually perfectly fine, but that's obviously not the case. Just because they can afford them doesn't mean they should buy them.

Go for whatever's cheapest. Usually it's a disk, and, unless it's an online title or some big stupid sandbox, you can sell it on once you're finished.

No they should be going for whatever they want to buy and not be dictated to by total strangers on what they should spend their money on.

Exactly.

Floex wrote:People who have gone console digital, how do you justify it to yourselves paying £60 for a brand new release?

I’d more open to disc-less future if the price adjusted accordingly.

With the combination of Games with Gold, backwards compatibility, sales, freebies, discounted codes, EA Access and Game Pass I find very little need to buy many games at full price on release day. I would still buy the occasional big favourite like a new Halo on release, but that'll be on Game Pass in future too. I've now amassed a larger library of games to play than I've ever had in any previous gen (and truthfully I'll probably never play them all) but for comparatively very little money really. It's convenient and clutter-free too.

Floex wrote:People who have gone console digital, how do you justify it to yourselves paying £60 for a brand new release?

I’d more open to disc-less future if the price adjusted accordingly.

Games with Gold/PS+

GamePass/PlayStation Now

Sales

Buying key from CD Keys

I have never paid anywhere near £60 for a game this generation and I only have two games on disc (both were gifts).

Some of the comments under that Eurogamer article.

It better have a strawberry floating MASSIVE hard drive.

Saint of Killers wrote:

KK wrote:The Microsoft GamePass at least makes their own titles, and a number of third party titles, much better value than purchasing outright.

Digital tends to work best overall when you’re not interested in purchasing games at launch. More recently games have been cheaper digitally (Shadow Of The Tomb Raider for example is already £27.50) but there’s no reselling opportunities.

This needs to be a thing next gen. (Wasn't it going to be a feature of the XB1 before those plans got ditched?) Would love it if they let us sell or trade digital games...

Refunds for digital games wasn't a thing until recently and while there's still a way to go before digital refinds become the norm on every platform I wouldn't be surprised if some system to trade digital games comes into play in the future.

I'll still be getting the disk based version of next gen if Boomerang still exists then.

If we are going to see download only consoles then I would like to see the ability for other companies to have an eshop on the console for direct downloads.

Hime wrote:Good news, I hope next gen launches with a cheaper diskless version.

I would be willing to bet they just pocket the extra money and charge a premium for a version with a disc drive, if they offer one at all. Console makers have been looking to kill the second hand market for years now and this is just a step in that direction.

Somebody Else's Problem wrote:It better have a strawberry floating MASSIVE hard drive.

TB or so would do as you can uninstall stuff you don't want to store all the time, then install it again later when you want it.

The real budget model for the future would have no disc drive, no storage, and basically be a dumb terminal for cloud based gaming. Wouldn't be surprised if that happened with the mid-gen refreshes.

Dowbocop wrote:The real budget model for the future would have no disc drive, no storage, and basically be a dumb terminal for cloud based gaming. Wouldn't be surprised if that happened with the mid-gen refreshes.

Like this? -

But what I am starting to hear more about is the second device, a streaming box that is designed to work with the company’s upcoming game streaming platform.

Scarlett Cloud as one person called it, is the game streaming service that we have all been envisioning ever since Microsoft showed off a demo game streaming at its all-employee meeting back in 2013. But this time, Microsoft has a path to bring it to market.

The second ‘console’ that the company is working on is a lower-powered device that is currently planned to ship with the next generation device that is designed for game-streaming. But the catch here is that Microsoft thinks it has figured out how to handle the latency sensitive aspects of gaming.

The cloud console will have a limited amount of compute locally for specific tasks like controller input, image processing, and importantly, collision detection. The downside of this is that it since more hardware is needed locally, it will raise the price of the streaming box but it will still cost significantly less than what we are accustomed to paying for a new-generation console which should help expand the platform’s reach.

https://www.thurrott.com/xbox/163896/de ... g-service#

Out the same time as his big brother but will cost $100-$120.

Monkey Man wrote:

Dowbocop wrote:The real budget model for the future would have no disc drive, no storage, and basically be a dumb terminal for cloud based gaming. Wouldn't be surprised if that happened with the mid-gen refreshes.

Like this? -

But what I am starting to hear more about is the second device, a streaming box that is designed to work with the company’s upcoming game streaming platform.

Scarlett Cloud as one person called it, is the game streaming service that we have all been envisioning ever since Microsoft showed off a demo game streaming at its all-employee meeting back in 2013. But this time, Microsoft has a path to bring it to market.

The second ‘console’ that the company is working on is a lower-powered device that is currently planned to ship with the next generation device that is designed for game-streaming. But the catch here is that Microsoft thinks it has figured out how to handle the latency sensitive aspects of gaming.

The cloud console will have a limited amount of compute locally for specific tasks like controller input, image processing, and importantly, collision detection. The downside of this is that it since more hardware is needed locally, it will raise the price of the streaming box but it will still cost significantly less than what we are accustomed to paying for a new-generation console which should help expand the platform’s reach.

https://www.thurrott.com/xbox/163896/de ... g-service#

Out the same time as his big brother but will cost $100-$120.

Sounds about right!

Green Gecko wrote:I think those people trading in all their disks for a rental agreement are going to regret it in 20 years.

Yeah this is the problem, do we trust game companies not to totally screw digital customers over?

What we want companies to offer is a persistent digital catalogue. There's no reason why Nintendo can't offer all their old games consistently - it's stupid that if you want to buy, say, Mario Kart 64, you need to go and buy an old N64 (I know it was on the Wii VC but not sure if you can still buy it from there). If you want to play a PS3 game, you should be able to buy it on the PS4 store.

Does any other medium work like this? There's not half as much hassle finding an old movie or an old book. I don't know why gaming is so keen to wipe the slate clean each generation (well, I know it's because companies what to get you to pay for re-releases as many times as possible and to drip feed old content). We are paying £80 for a PlayStation Classic, but those games should all have been playable since release. It's stupid to lock them away constantly on old hardware or to have rebuy them for the PS2, PS3, PS4 or the Wii, the Wii U, the Switch etc.

Credit to MS, they've eventually led the way with backwards compatibility and you would hope that's one area they'd want to progress in moving forward to their next console.

But like Gecko says, at the moment you're looking at being able to play your games for this generation only, and after that, worrying about what sort of hoops they are going to make you jump through. If you even get the bloody hoop offered to you in the first place.

Parksey wrote:

Green Gecko wrote:I think those people trading in all their disks for a rental agreement are going to regret it in 20 years.

Yeah this is the problem, do we trust game companies not to totally screw digital customers over?

What we want companies to offer is a persistent digital catalogue. There's no reason why Nintendo can't offer all their old games consistently - it's stupid that if you want to buy, say, Mario Kart 64, you need to go and buy an old N64 (I know it was on the Wii VC but not sure if you can still buy it from there). If you want to play a PS3 game, you should be able to buy it on the PS4 store.

Does any other medium work like this? There's not half as much hassle finding an old movie or an old book. I don't know why gaming is so keen to wipe the slate clean each generation (well, I know it's because companies what to get you to pay for re-releases as many times as possible and to drip feed old content). We are paying £80 for a PlayStation Classic, but those games should all have been playable since release. It's stupid to lock them away constantly on old hardware or to have rebuy them for the PS2, PS3, PS4 or the Wii, the Wii U, the Switch etc.

Credit to MS, they've eventually led the way with backwards compatibility and you would hope that's one area they'd want to progress in moving forward to their next console.

But like Gecko says, at the moment you're looking at being able to play your games for this generation only, and after that, worrying about what sort of hoops they are going to make you jump through. If you even get the bloody hoop offered to you in the first place.

It's not as simple as just offering it due to emulation and stuff, Nintendo manage it and then charge over and over for it.

Microsoft seems to be most consumer friendly where they manage to get the game going then you can use the old disk or buy it on the store.

Going forward itnwill only be companies being banana splits that stop it as it will be x86 architecture and in the case on Microsoft all sharing the windows 10 core so for them it's even easier as there is an element of shared code base.

Rightey wrote:

Hime wrote:Good news, I hope next gen launches with a cheaper diskless version.

I would be willing to bet they just pocket the extra money and charge a premium for a version with a disc drive, if they offer one at all. Console makers have been looking to kill the second hand market for years now and this is just a step in that direction.

Meh, the PC doesn't have a second hand market and it's the cheapest place to buy new games. It would be great if consoles followed and there were multiple places to buy downloads.

I hope Microsoft carry on from where they are now and whatever is next launches with game pass that includes a couple of launch games and all existing games running a bit better.

Floex wrote:People who have gone console digital, how do you justify it to yourselves paying £60 for a brand new release?

I’d more open to disc-less future if the price adjusted accordingly.

Totally agree. Take out manufacture, distribution and retailer cut and they should be half the price.